As some of you may know, I felt like shit last night.  On top of
whacking my head sunday night, the sinuses on the other side decided it
was time to play catch-up, including a sore throat.  Well, nothing
worked, and even the damn chloraseptic wore off too soon, so I asked hubby
to go out and get us milkshakes to fix my throat.  He got back about 10, just
in time to put on the news, right?


I get about halfway through my milkshake, look up, and there's
John Fucking FlipFlopper KetchupBoy spewing about how his religion
makes him who he is and how that should be important to everyone at
some speech he gave at Pepperdine (he was really in town to raise $$
for Angelides....)


I DID NOT throw my milkshake at the TV.  It was hard.  I DID
manage to grab the remote and change the channel, though.  But my hands
were shaking and I had to actually tell myself to put down the cup and
get the remote.


Hubby said he was proud of me.  Probably because he would have had to clean it up.....

Posted by: caltechgirl at 10:22 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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I think I've got a concussion.

I was sitting at the base of our stairs because it's a good place to watch TV and talk on the phone (to this lovely lady, my homeboy, and then my Mom last night, actually).  It's far enough away from the TV that it's not blaring into the phone, but directly across from the screen.  Plus the carpet is pretty nice.  Nicest carpet we've ever had, in fact.

So I was chatting away with Mom and the Princess decided to favor me with one of her toys.  Not thinking clearly, I leaned over to pick it up, and then sat up to toss it for her.

When I sat up, I brought the top of my head into direct contact with the bottom end of the handrail of the stairs at full speed.

You know the little birdies on the Warner Brothers' cartoons?  Yeah, I saw those.

Anyway, after about 30 minutes of ice and two Advil, I was ok, but this morning I'm sore all over and the headache?  She refuses the Advil and caffeine treatment.  I've had post concussion syndrome before (dropped on my head in college), so I know the drill.  At least it's just a regular headache, not a migraine, although even my damn teeth hurt.

Now it's just a matter of sitting here two hours and then driving home.  Yay, home.  Maybe I'll bugger off early.  I do have things I need to work on at home....

Posted by: caltechgirl at 12:45 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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Hubby and I were doing some shopping today, and we went into a local home and decorating store.  I was looking for a large casserole dish, so we went over to the kitchen section.

As we browsed the Clearance section, I noticed what clearly HAD to be a Wilton Armetale tray.  These things just don't hang around long enough to make it to clearance, you know?  I was intrigued to say the least.

So I asked him to pick it up:

The pattern on the edge was a bit unusual, so I looked at it more closely:

Yep, that's the Baltimore Ravens' logo.  When we turned the tray over, it indeed said Wilton Armetale, but it also said "manufactured for Smyth and Co, Official Jewelers of the Baltimore Ravens".

So if you're a Ravens fan stuck in SoCal, and you'd like to have a fancy tailgate party, let me know and I'll tell you where you can find a nice serving tray for cheap.

BTW, nice pics for a camera phone, huh?

Posted by: caltechgirl at 04:52 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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I just got FLOOR TICKETS to the Barenaked Ladies.

Tickets don't go on sale for another week, but Ladies Room members got first dibs today!

Yay!

Posted by: caltechgirl at 04:42 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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When I was 17 years old, in the summer of 1994, I was part of a summer program that invited science students to New York for two week to study and be a part of "real" high level research. Among the amazing and wonderful things we did that summer was a tour of New York City. After taking the Circle line out to the Statue of Liberty and back, we boarded the bus and went into downtown. We stopped at the foot of the World Trade Center.

I remember looking up and up and up, unable to see the top. Wondering at the immense feat of engineering standing before me. Face to face with these twin giants, my friend and I laughed at the presumption of a handful of terrorists who tried to bring it down with a truck bomb. My friend J said, "You know, they built the towers to withstand a hit by a 747." We were all duly impressed. It seemed like overkill.

And it became a joke amongst us.

Fast forward 7 years.

September 11, 2001. 9 am.
I was sleeping in. It had been a late night Monday night, as a friend who had been staying with us in NC was set to fly back to CA that afternoon. Also, I was supposed to teach that afternoon after taking her to the airport.

The phone rang. It was my husband, stationed in TX in the army. "Turn on the TV." he said. "Any channel".

I fumbled for the remote, half awake, and turned on the TV to see the WTC, one tower standing, the other on fire from a gaping hole near the top. The morning show people were just beginning to realize that it wasn't a cessna that hit the building, but a fully loaded jumbo jetliner.

Before I could comprehend that, another jet hit the other tower. And I knew.

My heart stood still. But still, I thought, the buildings will stand. The people can get out, or be rescued from the roof, right?

I called my parents and Ben, woke up my friends, and crawled to the big TV in the den. What next? Were there more planes? Were any of my friends there?

The rest of the day is a blur of images: People jumping from the buildings, the towers collapsing in a cloud of ash, that video of the asian woman running in high heels and nearly being run down as the towers collapsed behind her. I remember screaming "just take your damn shoes off so you can run..."

I don't remember eating, and I don't think I slept. I just sat in front of the tv. The towers came down. They were supposed to withstand the unthinkable, that kind of hit, but they came down anyway.

I spoke to my friend a few days later. We reminisced about that day at the towers, and how we all believed them to be invincible. And how that came to stand for a lot of things. And now those things were gone.

I think we grew up a lot on September 11, 2001. But it's easy to forget. It's easy to over analyze and twist the facts to fit your own mindset instead of facing the difficult facts:

+Nineteen Islamofascist fuckheads hijacked four planes
+They deliberately chose flights that would be the fullest and carry the most fuel
+They succeeded in crashing three of those planes into pre-selected targets
+It was NOT a government conspiracy. Unless you mean the governments of Iran, Syria, etc.
+2,996 innocent people died. Many of them heroes who died trying to save the lives of others
+Unless we wipe jihadist thinking from the face of this planet, something like 9/11 WILL happen again

And if you don't believe that with even some small part of your soul, then you need to get your head out of your ass.

Posted by: caltechgirl at 08:29 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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It's that time of year again.  Today is my DH's first day of school, so yesterday, of course, we spent all day making his classroom look pretty and organizing all of his books and papers and supplies.

33-36 students per class.  And as of 5:30 pm yesterday, he only had 32 chairs.  You gotta love it.  Hopefully that will be rectified soon.

And he doesn't have the worst of it.  The thermostat in the room next door went haywire over the summer and now only blows hot air.  In CA.  In Spetember.  With 37 bodies.  They told the teacher in that room that if they can't get it fixed today they will move him into another room until they can get the AC working.  On the other side of his room, there's no power to the outlets in the lab tables or the walls....  So having to play musical chairs doesn't really seem so bad.

One thing I do appreciate, though, is that he is teaching just one kind of class.  The same subject 5 times a day, rather than one class of this, one class of that, and three classes of the other.  It cuts his out-of-class work by 2/3!  Which is good.  With almost 200 students, he has a lot to do anyway.  I think we figured that he starts with 175 this year, which means it will be about 185 before the end of the month.

As for myself, we've been back to school for 3 weeks now, and things are starting to hit their rhythm.  I'm the course director for our freshman class, which means that I don't have to teach every day, but I am in charge and I have to make sure every thing is working according to plan.  Lecture and Lab both.

So far so good.  We have more students this year than last, and I think the students are all pretty smart.  I look forward to seeing what they will accomplish this year.

I had an epiphany on the freeway this am, while I was stuck in traffic.  But it must not have been that important, as I have no forgotten what exactly it was....  that's what it's been like lately.

I need a vacation just to catch up.  And maybe clean the house.

Posted by: caltechgirl at 11:24 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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